This year was a challenging one, and I’m sure many of you felt it too. I dealt with personal difficulties, health concerns, time constraints, and a summative review (a type of yearly teacher observation). Not to mention running to and from conferences and keeping The Cultural Classroom going, which I love! Honestly, now that the school year is over, I’m very proud of what I accomplished in the classroom with the cards I was dealt. I hope that if you had or are having a difficult year, you can focus on the positives too. Don’t let the negativity obscure all that you actually achieved!
This year, my students completed at least ten major cultural activities, each varying in length and difficulty. Additionally, we participated in almost daily or weekly mini-cultural reflections, such as listening to music in the TL, watching concerts in the TL, learning dance moves in 5 minute clips, etc. Sometimes I feel like a vast repository of random cultural artifacts because every day I would pick something that “felt right.”
Here are some of the major cultural activities that my students completed this year, which are available in my TPT store!!!:
- Afro-Latino Heritage Project
- Hispanic Heritage Month Project
- Día de los Muertos | Day of the Dead Pear Deck Presentation
- Indigenous, Native & Spanish Culture during Thanksgiving | Presentation & Test
- Bundle: New Year’s Eve and New Year’s/La Nochevieja y el Año Nuevo-No PREP
By keeping a steadfast focus on culture and interculturality in the classroom this year, I maintained a uniting force in our lessons and units. I would always say, “we are more alike than we are different!” Every year, I give formal and informal surveys to see how students feel about the course and my guiding light that “culture is the key to language acquisition.” Here is what my chiquis taught me this year:
Learning #1: Culture Connects
In response to the question “It is the end of the year. Do you feel like we covered some good cultural material? What have you learned about?” 81.8% of students said they felt a stronger cultural connection to Spanish. One student (AA) stated that they “got to see and live in the culture” in my class. Student GA wrote “I really enjoy learning about the connections between different languages and cultures.” Additionally, student ZH elaborated “I have learned a lot about Hispanic music, such as the different kinds of music, art, such as the different art forms and artists, history, such as the indigenous cultures and Afro Latinos, famous people such as Esteban Hotesse, and other aspects of Hispanic culture that have immersed me in the Spanish language and contributed to my understanding of all things Spanish.”
Linguists generally agree that languages cannot be studied in isolation from the cultures in which they are spoken
Witherspoon, Gary. “Language in Culture and Culture in Language.” International Journal of American Linguistics, vol. 46, no. 1, 1980, pp. 1–13. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1264442.
Learning #2: Culture Reflects
I love interculturality–when and where I can find intersections between our Target Language/Cultures and other Cultures/Languages, I’m there! I love the version of Super Junior’s “Ahora Te Puedes Marchar” because I get to show how K-Pop has connected with their Latino audiences by singing in Spanish! One day this year, I played it for fun and did my whole speech about cultures connecting. One of my Korean students in class couldn’t peel his eyes off the screen. He asked me–is this real? I was like, “yes!” It sparked a larger discussion that was so beautiful. This student was so happy to see himself reflected on the board! And I’ll tell you one thing–by the end of the year, he had one of the most beautiful Spanish accents out of all my students! Original video here
Learning #3: It’s Ok If It’s In English!
Sometimes when we are dealing with Spanish 1 or even Spanish 2, it is hard to find resources in the Target Language that meets our needs. I GIVE YOU PERMISSION TO USE ENGLISH RESOURCES. This brilliant poem by Elizabeth Acevedo is in English and talks about many complex issues for people in general. Afterwards (or even before) you can create simple questions in Spanish to ask about personal descriptions/etc. There’s ways to work around it! Comment or email me if you want more guidance on this!!! theculturalclassroomtpt@gmail.com
I hope post this was helpful for you! Let me know what you learned this year in your classroom!
-Allison
